What the doctor ordered

By FIONA RAE

Talking with Alex Kingston on the phone, you have the disconcerting feeling that you know her. That English accent, that straightforward delivery — after all, we've been watching her character in ER, Elizabeth Corday, for nigh on seven years.

It's something that happens to her all the time. Even on holiday in Austria at Christmas, a man at a market caught her eye, turned back and claimed, "I know you, I know you." Umm, I'm not sure, she said.

"And he said, 'yes, yes, we've met' and I said 'I don't think so' and it's awful, because I didn't say and I knew he must watch the show and he apologised profusely. He was probably walking away thinking I must have been an old girlfriend or a one-night stand or something!"

However, we've only got one more season of the groundbreaking medical drama to enjoy Corday.

The character who has been through a volatile relationship with fellow doctor Peter Benton, married another doctor, Mark Green, had a baby and watched Mark die of cancer, is leaving. She has come to a natural conclusion, says Kingston.

"We have a lot of new young actors who have joined this season and in a sense it's their time now and it's time for me probably to move on," says Kingston. "The writers are kind of involved with fleshing out these new characters, so less time is spent on writing stuff for my character.

"And also, all of the characters I had any relationship with have all gone, so it's a rather strange situation because I think the writers don't quite know what to do with my character any more."

She is surprised by how long she stayed, really. "I thought I'd be there a year and they'd throw me out!" But she also thinks that, rather than detracting from the show, the movement of characters on and off ER has added to it.

"I was talking with John Wells, who is the executive producer, the originator of the show, about this strange phenomenon of ER and he said if all of the original cast members were still on the show now, it probably wouldn't be running and I think it's the very fact that you have people leaving and new faces joining. "The fact is, ER isn't the actors, ER is actually the hospital. It's that building, which is very much like a hospital anywhere in the world. Doctors come and go, med students come and go and that's just the life of a hospital anywhere."

It's certainly part of ER's ability to appear to exist in real time and space. While the show is filmed in Los Angeles, the cast and crew go four times a year — seasonally — to Chicago to film exterior scenes. It keeps ER in the top five in the US, even now into its 10th season, a phenomenon no one seems to be able to figure out, says Kingston.

"I know the producers don't quite know what to do because they've never been in a situation like this before. It's just doing so well."

One new character is fellow Brit Parminder Nagra who, says Kingston, is doing really well adjusting to American life — better than Kingston did.

"She's much more together and organised," says Kingston, who found American technology difficult to cope with when she first arrived in the US.

"It just drove me crazy. And so much of America is automated, you very rarely get to just speak to a person, it's always via a machine to begin with, and I'm just not very good at that."

The good news is that although Corday hasn't had as much to do this season, she has been given a lot more fun. "Let's say she enters the dating game quite significantly," says Kingston, although she declines to elaborate. Our sources reveal (oh, all right, tvtome.com) that Corday gets it on with a new doctor, played by the not unattractive Bruno Campos.

It's going to be really tough to say goodbye to Corday, she says, and she may come back for guest appearances. But for now there are some hard decisions to make before filming finishes in May as to whether she would want to go on to another series in the US or take a break and make small movies or do some theatre. While doing a series is wonderful for its routine and financial stability it's easy to get lazy, she says, and not challenge the creative muscle.

Would she, however, be interested if a quality show like Six Feet Under asked her to join?

"I dunno, I haven't seen it," she laughs. "I watch very little television, I just don't have the time." ER and her 3-year-old daughter keep her busy. "I'm in bed by 9.30."

However, if it was a really good role, "then I would be a fool to turn something like that down just because I wouldn't want to be on it for five years or three years or whatever".

Who knows, she may even make her way down here. She was due to come last
summer, but the project fell through. Her good friend Andy "Gollum" Serkis has raved about us, and she loves Whale Rider.

"After three minutes into the movie where she's on a bicycle and she turns around and looks in her grandfather's eyes, I started crying and I didn't stop for the rest of the movie. I was an absolute mess. I was so glad we watched at home on DVD. I would have been a complete mess in the cinema, I was just sobbing and sobbing." She hopes Keisha Castle-Hughes wins the Oscar too.

"Anna Paquin won best supporting for The Piano and to be honest, I think Keisha did a far better job. She was incredible, she was in every frame of the movie and she's so luminous on screen."